Military service members assigned to the 7th Air Support Operations Squadron, Fort Bliss, Texas, and 729th Air Control Squadron, Hill Air Force Base, Utah, conduct warfare operations at the Tactical Operations Center-Light (TOC-L) on Oct. 14, 2022, during Project Convergence 22 experimentation at March Air Reserve Base, California.(U.S. Army photo by Spc. Brenda Salgado)

WASHINGTON — The Army took the next step its pursuit of tech for its Next Generation Command and Control (NGC2) initiative by reaching out for industry’s ideas Monday.

In a request for information (RFI) posted online, the Army’s program executive office for command, control, communications-tactical (PEO C3T) announced it is seeking input on “experimentation, pilots and, prototyping” in establishing NGC2. 

Monday’s RFI is the first one related to C2NG to come out of PEO C3T and came after the office held an industry day to provide more information to interested vendors on Sept. 16. The document was released “in accordance with the Army Futures Command (AFC) Characteristics of Need (CoN) requirement,” related to that office’s own interest in next-gen C2, which came out May 21, according to the RFI. 

PEO C3T’s RFI includes questions about how industry would “design and manage a common services architecture for warfighting applications” while allowing for a “plug-and-plan” architecture, and how industry would use a common data layer to leverage capabilities to “meet war fighting needs.” Furthermore, it asks how industry sees the role of the Army’s Unified Data Reference Architecture — a broader service framework — in creating and managing NGC2. 

The requirement will also include “maximizing vendor access to capabilities and users” all while aiming to bolster the relationship between industry and government. 

Additionally, all services and products that are chosen to be part of NGC2 will be “heavily dependent” upon progressive software analytics, artificial intelligence and machine learning capabilities to assist feedback in performance, the RFI states. 

NGC2, sometimes called C2 Next, is the service’s plan to create an integrated C2 structure focusing on data centricity “at every echelon,” which will be a “system of systems,” per the RFI. It’s designed to combine intelligence, C2 and fires all in one system so commanders can have information more readily available — a key driving idea behind the Pentagon’s wide Combined Joint All-Domain Command and Control effort.

RELATED: Army’s upcoming Project Convergence billed as early test for ‘C2 Next’ plans

The service will test out the NGC2 principle in March of 2025 at the Project Convergence capstone five event, Col Michael Kaloostian, the AFC’s networks and security director for NCC2, told Breaking Defense in August. 

“We are in the S&T [science and technology] phase, and we’re still doing [research and development] on this project,” Kaloostian told Breaking Defense during an Aug. 22 interview.

“We’re going to learn [with] each step. … It’s always gonna be iterative, because technology is always going to improve,” he later added.

The RFI released Monday is currently open for comment and will close on Oct. 4 at 5 p.m. ET.